Lady Macduff (‘Whither should I fly?’) and a page of Happy Days, for the contrast in mobility. The greying cad smiled graciously at the end and told Alice that Billie would have been impressed. ‘Billie Whitelaw?’ asked Alice. ‘Yes,’ said the actor, sleepily. ‘Do you know her?’ ‘No.’ ‘An extraordinary person,’ he whispered. ‘Oh,’ said Alice, her neck prickling. ‘Is – has –’ The actor cleared his throat. ‘I want you to go to weekend school,’ he said. ‘It’s very relaxed and non-competitive.’ When Alice walked into the common room of the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School, the lie was exposed. Her fellow applicants were already working, most of them – modelling, dancing, tennis-coaching. A number had Equity cards. They’d chosen the same speeches: Henry V, Hamlet or Portia. And they were beautiful: tall, muscular, slender, with poreless complexions and the slow gait of the infinitely eligible. When they spoke, laughed, scratched or lifted the flap of the drinks dispenser, there was silent applause. If you said anything, they smiled before answering. Candidates were divided into three groups of ten and sent away. The audition consisted of three different ‘modules’: workout/gym, voice/singing and text/perfor mance. Two of the three classes held no fear for Alice, who sang well and had her extended metaphors on a leash, but the third she dreaded. To a certain kind of child, the gym remains a scene of primal distress in which it is discovered that no wit or human kindliness can break a fall. One look at the dance- studio brought it all back: the high louvred windows behind wooden bars, the ropes hanging from the ceiling, the chewed mats, the lopped hor ror of the horse. ‘Acting,’ croaked the martinet in charge, ‘is what you do to become who you are. It starts with your body.’ To illustrate the point, she punched herself in the stomach. ‘Acting,’ she confirmed, in a subtly different register, ‘is the most physical discipline.’ Lisa Lee – Ms Lee – stopped to light a cigarette. She was small and ill with fitness, sun-dried almost. Her calves gleamed, but the bronzed skin was slack at the elbows. Her back was so supple, it was bent. Her yellow hair, teased into a spray, looked sore. ‘You’ve heard about staying power? Yeah? Well, it’s not just a figure of speech. It’s about physical stamina. Excuse me.’ The instructress coughed something up and nodded to herself. ‘Stamina. OK. Let’s get loose.’ She hit a boom-box and the gonging chimes of the Jacksons’ ‘Can You Feel It?’ sundered the air. Where Ms Lee had been, there was soon only a whirling vortex. ‘You gotta be able to breathe,’ said the vortex. ‘And breathe. And kick. And stretch. And a-round.’ After five minutes, the music stopped and Ms Lee remate- rialised. Nine out of the ten hopefuls adjusted their bandanas, did a quick shake-out. The other one simply shook. Her legs had gone into spasm, jerking backwards and forwards. Breath came in pants and squeaks, with cries inter mingled. The T-shirt in which she did the housework clung to her like a collapsed umbrella. She gagged and swayed, cheeks aflame, gripping the perished hem of the Turkish slacks she’d put on, just that morning, for luck. A girl in spandex brought Alice a chair. Lisa Lee took it away again. ‘She needs a rest,’ the girl remonstrated. ‘Don’t.’ Ms Lee held up a warning finger. ‘Not on my time.’ Stomach acids blurted into Alice’s throat. She swallowed quickly. ‘I can’t –’ ‘What did you say?’ ‘ –can’t–toofast. . .’ Ms Lee slung the stack-chair into a cor ner. ‘OK. Up and downs. Ceiling, toes. Fifty times. And one. And two.’ At the end of the line of jack-knifing athletes, Alice retched and quaked. She’d put her back out with the first stretch, but car ried on feebly splaying her ar ms, trying to reach over herself for fear of what might happen if once she stopped. An anaesthetic surge of terror bore her along. It was only when her torturer stopped the music for a second time and lit another cigarette that Alice realised she had been crying out in pain. Lisa Lee slouched towards her. ‘What are these?’ she said, pointing at Alice’s slacks. ‘It said – it – the list said – casual clo–’ Her legs had gone into spasm, jerking backwards and forwards. Breath came in pants and squeaks, with cries intermingled. The T-shirt in which she did the housework clung to her like a collapsed umbrella. JULY 2006 ı goodreading 51